The federal government sued Alaska elections officials this week as part of an attempt to preemptively line up a challenge to the results should Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan lose his reelection race.
The lawsuit, filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska, centers on the claim that a second candidate also named Dan Sullivan is only running “for the purpose of confusing or misleading voters and compromising the fairness of the ballot,” according to the filing.
When asked by a reporter about the lawsuit on Friday afternoon, President Donald Trump said he was “the one that said ‘do it.’”
The race is one of the most competitive in the country and has the potential to swing the balance of power in Congress’ upper chamber.
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The case, filed less than two weeks before Election Day, is before Judge Sharon L. Gleason, an appointee of President Barack Obama.
The second Dan Sullivan — who will appear as Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. on the ballot — filed to run three days before the filing deadline. The Trump administration’s lawsuit makes the case that if the incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan loses, an investigation should be carried out determining whether voters were confused about which Sullivan they were voting for before certifying any election results.
“It is vital that Defendants not certify any election result that may be impacted by voter confusion,” lawyers for the Justice Department wrote in the filing. “An election may be impacted by voter confusion if: (1) Senator Sullivan does not win the election; and (2) had all votes cast for Daniel J. Sullivan been cast instead for Senator Sulivan and Alaska’s ranked-choice process played out accordingly, Senator Sullivan would have won the election.”
Previous efforts by the Alaska Division of Elections and the state Republican Party to prevent the new Sullivan from running against the incumbent senator failed earlier this year when the Alaska Supreme Court ruled that both Sullivans could remain on the ballot.
The concern is less that the new Sullivan, who is running as a Republican, might win, but that he might siphon enough votes away from Sen. Sullivan that Democratic nominee Mary Peltola wins instead.
A DOJ spokesperson told The Washington Sun that the department is “taking the necessary steps to ensure that this frivolous candidacy does not undermine the integrity of Alaska’s election or the will of its voters.” They also pointed The Sun to a letter from Alaska’s Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher decertifying the new Sullivan’s candidacy after deeming it misleading.
In a statement to The Sun, Nate Adams, a campaign spokesman for Sen. Sullivan’s reelection campaign, said the campaign would “let the DOJ complaint run its course.”
“Alaskans can tell the difference between a Democrat sideshow and Senator Sullivan’s strong record,” Adams wrote.
Harry Child, a spokesperson for the Peltola campaign, called the lawsuit “a despicable political threat to overturn an election, designed by Senator Dan Sullivan’s allies.”
On Thursday, Attorney General Todd Blanche refused to rule out the possibility that his department would intervene in states’ independent processes for certifying their midterm elections, saying extreme scenarios could prompt federal intervention.
In a Truth Social post this week, Trump said his administration was looking at “powerful legal options to remove the fraudulent Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. from the ballot.”
“I am very concerned about the Dan S. Sullivan Race for the U.S. Senate in Alaska in that it is totally confusing,” Trump wrote in the post.
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